Most durable products are provided with a warranty. Under the terms of the warranty, the product manufacturer may guarantee the satisfactory performance of the product for a period of time referred to as the “warranty period”. The manufacturer may agree under terms of the warranty to repair, replace, or to otherwise service the product upon the occurrence of a defect, malfunction, or other problem during the warranty period. The length of the warranty period varies between products and manufacturers. Depending on these factors, typical warranty periods may range from 90 days to 3 years.
Providing an effective warranty period, and in particular determining the start of a warranty period, has proven difficult. Although the date of manufacture of a product may be known with precision by the manufacturer, this has not proven to be a satisfactory warranty start date. In many instances products are manufactured and then enter a distribution chain where they may be shipped and warehoused several times before they arrive at the ultimate seller. Once at the ultimate seller, the product may be stored for another period of time before sale. This can result in a significant time lapse between manufacture and ultimate sale, with the result that consumers are unfairly penalized if the date of manufacture is used as a warranty start date.
As a result, most present day warranties begin on the date of purchase. While this has solved a few problems related to date of manufacture warranty start dates, it has introduced new sets of problems. For example, it is difficult for the manufacturer to know the date of actual sale to an end user. Users may be required to mail product documentation, sales receipts, and the like to the manufacturer to mark the start of a warranty. Because of the effort required, purchasers often do not comply, which can lead to loss of warranty rights and resultant low customer satisfaction. To avoid this low customer satisfaction, manufacturers may waive requirements when an end user has a product failure and instead rely on the end user's affirmation alone that the product was purchased on a date that places the failure within the warranty period. Such reliance, however, can disadvantageously lead to lengthened warranty periods as end users may fabricate purchase dates to obtain warranty coverage.
Additional problems with purchase based warranty start dates relate to users that may purchase a product but not use it for a prolonged period. Business purchasers, for instance, may purchase products such as computer peripherals that are shipped and stored after purchase before actual use. This can disadvantageously delay the actual product use for substantial time periods after purchase. For these users, the warranty period is effectively shortened because of the delay between purchase and actual use of the product.
These and other unresolved problems remain in the art.